What Banks Don't Want You to Know with Paul Withers of Direct Bullion

Exposing the bank's control of your money. So I have with me here my dear friend Paul Withers, who owns Direct Bullion and he's been buying and selling gold for what, more than a decade?

Yeah, 14 years.

Wow. So you know all the tricks that the banks get up to in controlling, stopping payments.

I mean, we've had our fair share. Yeah.

And you got some pretty shocking stories to tell.

I. I do.

Wow. Okay. We're going to talk about what Paul thinks about a cashless society. If that's really their ultimate goal, if and how they control and who actually owns your money. How can you actually buy crypto or gold or anything like that? I've got some stories of my own. It was a shocking. Friend of mine tried to take 20 grand out in cash, like almost a crime against humanity. What happened? Another client of ours tried to buy crypto and she was forced to call it a scam. We're going to talk about all these things because, look, my mission is to help as many people on this planet get better financial knowledge. And I know, Paul, you were advised to be careful about what you say and I'm obviously going to try and get it all out of you. Look, we don't want to be cancelled and we're not just criticizing the banks for the sake of it, but I think it's really important that everyone knows. If you put your money in the bank, is it yours? What's happened to it? Can you get it out? Can you pay? Can you buy crypto? Can you buy gold? How much of it is controlled? We're both friends with Nigel Farage. We knew him when he went through his debanking scandal. Is this fair? Is this right? Is your money safe in the bank? All these things. So where do you want to start? Should we start with whose money is it in the bank? Like, Because I think everyone just assumes, well, it's my money who owns the money in the banks.

So the legal definition of this is when you deposit money into a bank, it becomes the banks, it's not no longer your money.

Right.

I'll say that again just because I.

Think you should say it again and I think so when. So legally, your savings and your money in your current account, legally, is not your money.

Correct. When you put money into the bank, it's no longer your money, it becomes.

The bank's as a. I guess, because I looked at the terms and conditions and it's quite shocking really. But in the terms and conditions, the words that I read were that you're loaning the bank money. So is it a loan to the bank of which they almost create like a loan note or an iou? How does it work?

So this is the correct lord abiding definition of it.

Law abiding their laws.

In the uk, the law is that when you deposit money into a bank, it becomes debt owned to you by the bank.

Debt owned to you by the bank.

Yeah. So it's not a bailment of your actual notes. So this is something that the bank owes to you.

So what does that, what does. It's not a bailment of your actual notes.

So you know, you know, like if you was to put in £100,000 into the bank, that wouldn't be segregated into a hundred thousand that you've put in. This just goes into the pot owned by the bank.

So it's not ring fenced as or allocated as your money, you're saying?

Correct. Okay, yeah. So you're a creditor, that's what it is. Your right to call in the debt is defined by a contract, by the regulation. So obviously the banking sector would crumble if. If there wasn't rules in place to ensure that you got your capital that you put in there.

Yeah, but I mean, there are such things as bank loans. Yeah, they have happened.

Yeah, yeah, of course.

And if you go back enough through history, they're quite regular.

And the next time that happens, There's. You remember 2008, Northern Rock? Northern Rock, yeah. People queuing up at the bank. Government had to come in, bail that government out, Bail that bank out. Sorry, that no longer can happen. That's now illegal in the uk.

So. So if there's a run on a bank, then your money's gone.

No, there's a bail in.

But that costs the taxpayer, doesn't it?

No, because the bail in is all of the people that have deposited funds in the bank, they will use that money to keep the bank afloat. So all the money that you've got in the bank, Joe Blogg's next door. Everyone that hsbc, Barclays, all the depositors that have money in that bank, if that bank were to go bust, every deposit as money would be used to keep the bank afloat. And you know what you'd be giving in exchange?

What?

Shares in a worthless bank.

So basically your money will be used to fund the bank.

That is a bail in.

Wow, that. Yeah, that doesn't sound like what we sign up to when we save our money. Yeah, because I think public perception is when you save your money, it's still yours. You get A return and then when you want it, you can get it. But I don't know if I'm right about this, Paul. I think I am, but I did my research. But historically inflation seems to be higher than the actual rate of interest that the bank gives you. Because I remember when interest rates were 5 or 6%, but you weren't getting that, certainly not in your current account. And if you know in your trading business account, you're getting virtually nothing even when interest rates are high. So you're only getting it in your savings account, but you're not getting it all. Or if you are getting a higher rate of interest, it's on some essentially long term you can't access the money. So if long term inflation is higher than the interest that the bank passes on to you, then you net lose money saving.

That's the great transfer of wealth, right?

Well people think about the transfer of wealth being from the poor to the rich, but what you're saying is it's from the masses to the banks.

This is, this is where.

Is that what you're saying?

It's happening? Yeah, of course.

So you're saying the greatest transfer of wealth is from the everyday saver to the banking system.

Everyday savers are losing money every day. You can't even see it.

The accounts are even called everyday saver and you're saying they're losing money every day.

Of course when you look at the inflation right now, you know, what is it at the minute?

Well, the thing is there's no way.

To actually really tell, right?

Yeah. I mean even if you said what it is now, if you quoted CPI or whatever one, it's obviously going to change. But they don't put everything in this basket.

No, of course they don't. And they manufacture it to what suits them on that particular year. One year something's included, the next year it's not. So there is no real indication of what inflation inflation is. The real people that know, you don't need economists to tell you what the inflation rate is. The real people that know it is the people that are going down the shop every day. Yeah, yeah. Everyday people, they know what the rate of inflation is. But the problem we find it faces the rate of inflation today. Yes, that might be 2, 3% on last year, but we've got to go back to 20, 22, 23, 10% double.

Digits at one point. Wasn't it more?

Yeah, easily reality. 20, 25%.

Wow. So you think when they said it was 10 or 11%, you think it's Double what they tell you easily.

You look at the prices of when we went through that period of, you know, I think it was middle of 20, 23, everything went up by an obscene amount, you know, and.

And it doesn't go back down.

No, it doesn't.

Doesn't go. It doesn't go back.

So now you've got this area where you're looking at inflation on last year. Yeah, but really, what about two years ago, three years ago when it was a lot lower? I can tell you for a fact, look at how many people's wages have gone up. 20, 25, 30%?

None.

I'd say. Not many.

None, you know. So wages aren't keeping up with inflation?

Of course not.

Interest rates and savings aren't keeping up with inflation, which basically means if you save money, you lose money. So Robert Kiyosaki says savers are losers. And I always just used to think, well, he wasn't being very nice and he was calling them losers. What he means is savers lose money. Now, if you think about it, that makes sense for the bank because then they must be making money because how can they make money if you're also making money? Doesn't make any sense, does it?

Well, they make money and obscene amounts of money because they take your money and they put it out there to work.

Do they lend and invest it?

They invest it. Lend it into all sorts of crazy schemes. Look at 2008, you know, that was heavily leveraged in the mortgages. Yeah. Subprime mortgages especially.

Yeah.

You know, and that crashed the world's economy.

Right, yeah.

It's no different today.

No.

You know, they stress test the banks to. I believe it's about 4% of liquidity.

So what you're saying is if I put 100 quid in, they only have to keep 4 quid in. 4% because I thought it was 10.

No.

What do they call this? Fractional reserve.

Yeah, yeah. So then they'll just take that money and put it out there.

So. Right, like just listen to this. So you're saying for every hundred quid I put in the bank to save it for when I need it, there's only actually four that they legally have to keep and they can lend or invest. 96.

I think it's 4% currently. Yes.

Wow. So what if I want my 100? Well, what if you want your 100 quid and everyone. Well, what if they've loaned out 96%, but there's a bit of bad news and 5% or 10% of depositors savers wanted their money out on the same day.

Northern Rock.

Northern Rock. So basically that's a liquidity event.

You would be queuing at the bank. But that won't happen because.

And the problem with your queueing at the bank, all you need is one image on social media for a queue at the bank. And everyone's going to go and queue at the bank.

Correct.

And then the banks are just going to shut the door and then take your money, which they already have anyway.

But the problem that we've now got is if you look back to 2022, I believe it was Silicon Valley bank went bust. Credit Suisse bust.

Yeah.

These are all big investment, some American banks. Yeah. First Republic.

Right.

You know, these are all.

So when you say investment banks, what do you mean?

So these are, these are banks that primarily take wealthy investors. Right. You know, high net worth, take their funds, go out there, invest it. That might be an M and A property.

Yeah.

You know, all sorts of funds. You know, the things that get the, you know, get the, get the economy moving.

Yeah.

But they do go into high risk and if you're a bank that specializes in tech like Silicon Valley, then you've.

Got that extra risk.

There's a lot of tech businesses that have taken a lot of money and gone to what, Nothing?

Yeah.

You know, so you look at those banks and I believe in 2023. More banks went bust in 2023 than any other year in human history.

So why wasn't this a massive scandal all over the front page of all the news everywhere?

Well, it was.

Was it?

Yeah, there was a lot of activity about, activity about it. But, but what happened was, is there was no real aftermath because what happened was bigger banks were buying those smaller banks up, taking their bad debt and then putting it through their business. But the problem that we then saw was is the companies that were buying these banks were now starting to struggle and that was at the back end of 2024.

So do you think there's this massive pent up, potentially huge banking crash that could happen again like 2008?

I think so, yeah. I think I've said it for, I've been thinking, feeling it for, for a long while now that something big is coming. What that is, I don't know. I think I've spoken to you about this before. I've got a funny feeling it is going to be along the banking side of things. You never know. Right.

Yes.

Until it, till it comes. But I do think that the banks are over leveraged. I think they're they're very risky.

By over leverage, you mean 96% savers money is out being loaned and invested. Correct. And it isn't their money, but they have kind of tricked us with their terms and conditions to make it their money.

People have to get mortgages. Right. Where'd they get that money from?

The banks.

The banks? Yeah. Where does the bank get the money from?

Central bank.

Where does that money come from?

Well, you're the expert. Where does that money come from? I mean, don't they just.

Thin air.

Yeah. Don't they just literally. Well, they don't print it anymore. People say they just print the money. They used to say that. So. So it's literally just a digital creation.

How it works is they don't actually just go and print money. It doesn't. Look, there's not a machine. There is a machine. It's not like there's a machine.

It's just quite a low percentage of the money now, isn't it?

It is, yeah. How it works is a government will need to raise money. Right. They know that. Right. We need to fill this huge debt burden that we've got. Right. We need to go out and raise.

But doesn't that just add more to the debt burden?

It's the biggest Ponzi you've ever seen.

Is it a Ponzi? Because some people call fiat currency a Ponzi scheme, don't they? Because it keeps going down in value, but you keep taking more money off the taxpayer or the, you know, the saver.

You can't call it a Ponzi scheme because it's backed by the government. You know, the government, at the end of the day, they are the treasury. Right? The treasury is there to give the economy liquid funds. You know, it's therefore to make sure that the economy survives.

But if the central banks, governments can print money at will, put the debt onto us, charge the interest to us, either force us to go bust, or they go bust and then get bailed out or bailed in. Isn't it all just some big illusion.

That gears us towards a digital currency?

That sounds like the perfect time to talk about cashless society. So, um, so you're saying that's where we're being maneuvered towards a central digital currency.

No currency in history has lasted more than 50 to 100 years. Really? No fiat currency?

Not, not one.

Not one.

Name me one that sounds like not very long.

I know the pound, okay? Look at the variation, look at the variations of the pound and how that's, that's, that's maneuvered throughout history.

How long does the average currency last? This is what Grok's saying.

Your favorite, your best friend.

Yeah.

But even if you look at the British currency, you know, what was it?

Oh, wait a minute. Fiat currency system. An average lifespan of 27 to 60 years before collapsing to hyperinflation. Yeah, you were spot on. I mean, you knew that.

But if you look at.

Let me just read that again. So, okay, this is taken from X. So like, give it some context. But the average lifespan of a currency is 27 to 60 years before it collapses due to hyperinflation. Kelsey, you need that probably at the start. So US dollar post 1971 gold standard as an example. Wow. So what you're saying then is in our lifetimes on average, the currency that we're holding is going to go basically to zero.

No, I wouldn't say it goes to zero. They just manufacture it into a new version.

Okay, but if we're caught in hyperinflation, that could happen to us. I mean, so you remember the Zimbabwe, Zimbabwean dollars? Everyone's got wheelbarrows full of cash that's worth nothing.

So they lighten it for heat.

Yeah.

So what typically happens is. Is if you look at. I think the Romans are a great example. Look at how the Romans went from being the biggest, fastest growing empire to nothing in, what was it, 300 years. Right.

Okay.

Relatively quick. Right. In terms of. But if you look at how they started with their gold coins, which were array of gold coins, they used to trade these. Then eventually what they used to started doing is they started having a bit of silver to these coins.

So this is the start of inflation.

So they started to liquidate the value of it. Yeah. To the point where it becomes so worthless that, you know, their currency pretty much vanished.

Right. So that. That was human greed, I suppose. Was it?

What's the difference between then and now?

So you're saying now inflation is human greed.

So every.

And it will be saying inflation is still human.

If you look at the way that you go through history. Yeah. I'm not a historian, so, you know, this is just what I've researched in my own findings.

Yeah.

But if you look, it seems to me as a normal commoner outside of the political world, that you create this huge amount of inflation by leveraging the crap out of your currency so you creating extra debt because you have only got a short period of time to make a difference. So they don't care what happens in 20, 30 years time. They're here for now. I built that bridge. You know, we made this happen. You know, it's all about the now. So they create this huge amount of debt.

Yeah.

Then what happens is you get to a point where it becomes unsustainable. Like people who go out and get credit cards that don't have the means to pay for it, they go out, they buy whatever they want. They go and buy all these expensive trainers, and it gets to the point where they go, oh, I need to get another credit card to pay that credit card. Then it gets to the point where they can't keep up with any of the payments and they just have to go bust.

Right?

Yeah.

So currencies do that.

That is how I feel all currencies are.

Right. And essentially inflation. Could you argue inflation is kind of like a silent tax on us?

It's a massive tax on us.

Yeah. Because. Because inflation costs us. Because inflation is. That gold coin, which was 99.9% gold, is now 97% gold and 3% silver or 3% lead, so it's worth 3% less.

This is why I've always said to you, haven't I, since the time that I first met you, that the gold price never changes. The gold price buys the same amount of product today as it did 50 years ago, as it did 100 years ago, as it did 500 years ago.

So you're saying gold is.

It's the true reflection of where the economy is.

Right. So gold's the actual value.

Gold is the value.

And it is unmanipulatable by inflation.

Correct.

Which I suppose a bit like Bitcoin is unmanipulatable.

Correct. And it also happens.

I want to get back to this inflation bit. It wasn't on the questions, but I think it's really important. So initially, if someone is minting gold coins, putting them out into the market and putting some lead in it, and not enough to be noticed, just like now. Not enough to be noticed. That's essentially theft from the people. So is inflation theft from the people? Because some economists say you need 2% inflation to encourage money moving in the economy. Because if money. If there was no inflation, or if even if there was deflation, people would hold money because it's not going down or it's going up. So economists, like, have this theory that you need about 2% inflation so that it just keeps money going through the economy. But you're saying, well, it's people debasing gold, so what is it? Is it theft?

I truly believe, yes, you need to have money moving at all Times they.

Yeah, we need to trade, but you've got what you're selling. I need to buy it. It's a modern form of barter. If money doesn't move, services and products don't move.

Correct. Yeah. You need to have movement of money. And yes, you could argue that a level of inflation encourages the movement. It does encourage the movement also. But if you was to have a period of deflation where you do sort.

Of where money goes up, basically.

Yeah.

You want currencies go up.

You, you, you want to empower your currency. Right. You want to have the most powerful, powerful currency out there.

Yeah. But if you had deflation, people would stop spending it because it would go up, not down.

Yes, but at the end of the day, people still have to spend money.

Yeah.

You still got to buy things, Right. You can't just not spend and think, right, okay, you've still got to buy things.

Right.

So there will always be movement. But it's just.

What's going to happen is why isn't there like small amounts of deflation in currencies then, regularly?

Good question.

Yeah.

Why isn't there?

Well, because then there's. They can't create more debt.

I guess if you have a. To, if you was to do a level of deflation, some, you've got to do something, right, to, to reduce the.

You got. Maybe pay off some of your national debt. Yeah.

You'd like to think so, right? Yeah, yeah. So, you know, think of it as. Think of the actual business, you know, if you're heavy, heavily leveraged. Yeah. You've got loans coming out left, right side, you're really high overhead, you've got massive overhead. You are to the max, right?

Yeah.

What's the first thing you want to do when you, you know, you start.

Well, you might want to get the overhead down.

You want to start reducing it, right?

Yeah. Get some of the loans paid.

So when you start reducing it, you know for a fact, you free out more money. You do free up, but it gives you a bit of headwind, Right. You get a bit of space. So then you can start to, you know, you in the. This is what frustrates me about the UK at the moment. What are we doing? What are we growing towards?

I mean, what are we doing? Like. Good question. Like the uk. What are we doing?

What are we doing?

Labor. What are we doing? That's a very good question. I mean, we're borrowing more money, we're taxing the fuck out of society. House prices are unsustainably high, Interest rates are not historically wildly high, but they're a lot higher than they were 10 or 15 years ago. Crime is at a low level, basically legal in the uk, we're exiling all the millionaires and then therefore all that extra tax revenue is going to have to come from the working and middle.

Class, which is impossible.

Which is impossible because they're already taxed up to the hilt. So. Yeah. I don't know if it was a rhetorical question, but I've just answered it. That's what's happening in the uk.

So I mean, look at the Middle east now. You can't argue they've got a plan.

Right.

And we're not just a vision. Yeah. We're not just talking about Dubai here. You're looking at. They're all on the same bandwagon at the moment. Yeah. I mean I was in Saudi for a month. What a project they're doing out there. They have a firm plan of where they're going. Do you see mass inflation out there on that level? No. You know, and I know obviously there's things about their human rights and stuff like that, which is, you know, you don't want that necessarily. Not saying we've got to copy their exact model, but you can sit there and see they've got a plan, you know. All right, we don't have. Well, we do have it, but we don't use it. The level of oil that they've got to make them rich. But they're obviously reinvesting that into areas like have you seen the line that they're building in Neom? That's phenomenal. You know, I went to the Red Sea project. Phenomenal.

They're recruiting entrepreneurs from the uk. So many millionaires I know are leaving and one in three are going to Dubai and they're literally recruiting people from the UK saying, come over.

Yeah. Because they know that we all these.

Golden visas you can get really cheap, you know, these support for creators and helping you with studios and setting up your business quick and cheap. And 10 year, like working visa is not a lot of money.

No. So because I'd argue we're one of the most intelligent nations there is.

Well, we have the history.

Yeah, we definitely do. I mean I just watch Formula One.

Yeah.

And I look at the engineers, 90% of them all from Britain.

Yeah. You know, we've fintech, we're great in the uk.

I know it is so frustrating to see that we've got a real good base case to be a wonderful nation again. But the route that we're going down at the moment with the level of debt, the mass immigration.

Yeah.

Illegal immigration.

Okay. Anyway, that's for another.

That's another show. But I think that's all gearing towards the reason why the economy is in its state. It is. Which it leads to the inflation.

Yes.

Why? So what, everyone is poorer.

Yeah. So, I mean. Yeah, so you're looking at the over. You're looking at everything as how it affects the economy. So I suppose if you have pretty much open borders, you're going to bring a lot of people who aren't going to contribute to the economy. They're going to be a consumer of the economy, they're going to cost a hell of a lot of money in upkeep on asylum, et cetera. So per capita we're getting poorer and poorer. This is actually happening. Yeah, it's a mess. So let's go back then to digital central central bank digital currency, cbdc. So you think this is all part of the plan, is it? You think that as the fiat currencies, which last 27 to 60 years as they devolve evolving, will be a central bank digital currency in the UK or the world. Is that what you think is going to happen?

If you look, I think it was the late 40s or 50s when we come away from the penny farthings and shillings. Was that in the late 50s? I think it was something like that.

Okay, I'll take your word for it. Yeah.

How long ago was that? 60 years ago. 70 years ago? Yeah. That was the first change. Obviously there's a bit of uproar. You, you know, we're going into this new style of currency. Everyone gets used to it, everyone hangs onto it. Now we're at the point where with the introduction of Bitcoin and digital currencies, it will be a case of that. We go into cbdc, there will be uproar, people will be okay.

Do you think a central bank digital currency is good or bad for humanity?

I think we're already a part of it anyway because we are so reliant on tapping our cards and tapping our.

Phone and our money is basically digital anyway.

And I can transfer you money in a heartbeat. You can transfer your.

Well, we'll talk about that in a minute. Can you?

Well, yeah, can you? But you can send money to someone in Australia or digitally.

Okay.

So on that aspect. So we're nearly there already we're in it. You know, in the last 10 years we've all been participating in an experiment we never realized and I think over.

Intentional Experiment, you think?

Yeah, of course. Everything's intentional when it comes to the banking side.

Right, right.

So I think over the next five years, I think it would be, as soon as that there will be an introduction of a official government backed CBDC central bank digital currency.

Do you think simultaneously they'll remove cash from society?

I think it will be a slow process and they'll probably give us a year to phase it out. But when you do that, then what happens to the mass debt burden and the inflation?

You tell me.

Well, if you've got a digital bank that you can just completely control, you know, this is what I see. I think it can be in the good side of it. I think it will be easy to use and I think it'll be very quick and transparent. That's probably the only good side to it. On the bad side of it, I think it will be too easy to use. It'll be completely transparent. You'll have a tax bill which they'll.

Just digitally take out your account.

Done.

Parking fines digitally taken out your account.

Anything that you do that is you.

Put a social media post.

Yeah. That is untoward.

Fined or bank frozen.

Yeah.

Of course you don't like your political leaning. Debanked.

And then where does it stop? You know, every single month, you know, if you have a fine of any type or if you, if you do something that you know isn't in the. Look at China. Social scoring.

Yeah.

Know if you have a scenario.

So basically social credit.

Yeah.

If you listen, you get given your amount that you're allowed this month and.

Let'S say you like a gamble at the weekend, but all of a sudden you do a bit too much gambling. You know, where does it stop? Because they'll be able to see everything.

Well, but maybe they can already.

Well, of course they can.

I mean, apparently HMRC in the uk, like the IRS in the us, they have more powers than the police. So if they want to look at every single record of every single transaction you've had, they can. So they're already doing it, of course.

They just.

They're already doing it. So then that just your bank records, right? Yeah, yeah. And if, if you know. Because I think these entities like the central banks and the governments, they're supposed to be independent and you'd want them to be independent, otherwise you have globalization. But I'm not sure that they are. And it feels like hmrc, central government, central banks, it feels like there's just all one machine. Look at what happened when Keir Starmer wanted to stop the riots. So basically just. Basically just changed the law and just putting people in prison for social media posts. So, yeah, where does it end? Imagine if they want to lock you down, they can just stop your transactions digitally. They'll even be able to track you like GPS or where you're going. So as soon as you walk outside the boundary of your front gate, oh, your bank's frozen now. It doesn't work and it only works when you walk back into the house. Like they could do that, they have the power to do that. And like you don't have any cash to have some level of freedom. Because I see cash as freedom because you can still go and use it and pay for it. Does that not scare you?

Yeah, of course. My problem is, my biggest fear is I already, I'm aware of that. There's going to be millions of people that aren't. That's the problem.

But by the time they are aware of it, it's going to be too late.

Be phased in.

Yeah. So you don't have a choice.

Yeah.

And that's the end. And so now you'll have to do exactly what they say. And if you park one inch that way you've got an automatic flow fine. If you're one day late on your tax return, you get an automatic fine. If they decide, ah, we, we want inflation to be high, it'll be high. If they feel like they want to pump the economy, they might, they might be able to say, oh, you've got to spend three grand of your money this month. They just literally could do what they.

Want, take VAT in real time.

So. So yeah, one of the great benefits of being an entrepreneur is you pay tax later when you're employed, you pay tax at Source first, where an entrepreneur, you take the vat, you take your money and then you pay your VAT bill quarterly or you pay your tax in arrears and you can work the tax bill down with some tax breaks. So they can just take it all at Source now immediately, and who knows.

Whatever else they could bring into it.

And who knows whatever extra taxes they can add if they want. Oh, and here's something I thought about. So when there's a digital transaction, am I right in thinking that the bank makes a cut of that?

It depends.

Well, if I pay you something through the bank, doesn't the bank take a 2, 3%?

No. If I transfer you £100, you get £100.

Yeah. But if I buy something from you, doesn't the bank take a cut of that transaction?

The bank doesn't. Yeah, the payment gateway does. Okay, So I have, yeah, the merchant, I have to go through a gateway.

So to me, merchant equals bank. Yeah, Central bank equals bank. High street bank equals bank. Blackrock equals bank. You know, controller of money equals bank. But I know this because actually one of my banks is the one that charges me. But on all the credit card and debit card transactions we have to pay about 3%. So on all that to run our business, if I sell you something for 100 quid, I get 97 and the bank gets three. Now if you, if we can't do this anymore, unfortunately. But if you paid me cash, I get 100. If you pay me via the bank, I get 97, the bank gets 3. So all of a sudden I thought, well wait a minute, how many more extra trillions are the banks going to make with no cash? Because all that cash they're not getting their 3% on. By the way, some taxi drivers get charged 5% which is half their profit. So now all of a sudden a cashless society means every single transaction they're going to earn their 3%. What if they decide they want to earn 10% tomorrow? What can you do? Nothing.

Well, you can look at businesses that offer a lot less. There are individual companies out there that you can, you can do payments through. It doesn't have to be through the bank. The banks are probably the most expensive. That's like changing your currency through the bank. It's just ludicrous. You wouldn't do it. They're extremely expensive.

But I mean a lot of people do, don't they?

Of course, that's what people know, right? Yeah, but then you have the new Neo banks. So the likes of Revolut Monzo, they have, you know, facilities where it's very, very cheap for you to transfer money.

For now.

For now, yeah, of course.

Because normally what happens when a challenger institution comes in, it's cheaper and then all your money goes there. And then they boil the frog and sweat up the fees. I don't know. Have you ever, do you ever move stationary providers?

No.

Okay, so we have to spend tens of thousands on stationery here. I just saw a massive box of pens and post it notes and everything. And here's what they do. The new stationary provider pitches you and says, oh, we can be, we can save you 30% on your stationary contract. Move over to us, you move over to them, you save 30% on your first purchase and they bore the frog and they just sweat the prices up. And then before you Know it, it's more expensive than the last one. This is what will happen with the Challenger bank, surely.

Yeah, I mean then. But then someone new will come along, right?

Yeah, but then it's too late for you. Like I'm scared of not having an alternate currency. So before we do have an alternate currency, Bitcoin, gold. Okay, so I want to come to that in a moment, but I don't know if anyone's read the Creature of Jekyll island, but apparently there was a cartel, private get together of some of the biggest banks in the US and they essentially monopolized the currency and wiped out all the smaller banks. Back then there were lots of smaller banks and there were multiple different currencies in circulation in America. And then it became essentially an agreed monopoly, a cartel. The good thing about, I mean, I mean it would feel weird, wouldn't it, if there are four different currencies in the uk but the good thing about that is you can choose the best one at the time and you have competition, which you need. So does it not worry you if there's one central currency and no competition to that currency?

Of course. That's why I think that if ever there's a, if ever this does come to light, then there has to be a vote for it. And I would hope that everyone would veto it.

But most people don't know because I speak to people on the streets on my TikTok and I always talk about paying for cash and I resist companies that don't take cash. And you know, if you go on my LinkedIn there's thousands of people and they say, oh, but it's convenient and are this theft with cash and security and safety, they haven't got a freaking clue what's going on. That's why people like us are doing content like this. Okay, so we've covered what you think of a central digital currency. Want to come to Bitcoin and especially gold because gold's your thing. But have you had difficulties being paid to sell someone gold or trying to buy decent amounts of gold? Have you had problems with bank accounts being shut down or payments not allowed to go through?

I have had problems in the past, yes. Been very fortunate that I've managed to have good relationships with the banks after scenarios that. So to give you an example, during COVID So March, sorry, April 2020, when country went into lockdown, there's no logistics, no supply chain. No supply chain at all. No one working in the vault, nothing at all. We were so fortunate that we managed to obtain a Line of credit where we could still order gold live, the trade would be placed and we could backfill the order when the gold become available. Sorry, when the logistics become available to send the gold. So we went through a period of about four months with placing trades but no deliveries. We informed everyone that, you know, it's likely that you're not going to get a delivery for six months plus, you know, that's what we're being told. A gentleman paid decent sum of money, put it into gold, was contacted by his bank during the lockdown period to say, we can see that you've spent X amount. That's outside your normal habits. What's this for? He said, gold. I wanted to buy gold. And they said, have you had delivery yet? And he said, well, no, I only bought it a couple of days ago. They've informed me that the delivery will be a period of time. That's all they needed.

Right.

So there and then they contacted our bank. Our bank was frozen. This is now, let me remind you, this is during COVID so now I can't log on to my bank.

So this person was frozen from buying gold from you?

We were frozen.

You were frozen from delivering your gold from money that he'd paid.

We were frozen from everything, so we couldn't operate.

So in lockdown, as someone who sells gold professionally for a living, you were frozen and not allowed to receive money.

Or couldn't access any funds at all? We couldn't pay any of the staff. We couldn't pay our advertising for gold. Yeah, couldn't do any of it. Couldn't even. So we placed the trades, but we couldn't fulfill the orders because we couldn't access the money.

But why would the banks shut you down for selling gold when gold is more real money than money?

So I know, I can see their standpoint on it and I will explain. So our account's completely frozen. We can't do anything. I spent, I would say, nearly a month calling our bank, and for a month, every single time I called them, I'd be on ringing for two hours, two and a half hours to speak to someone. It would go through to their fraud department team who were working from home. They had no access to the management side of it. So we were in this perpetual state of getting nowhere. It was awful. And we got to the point where we had to say to them, so what's going on? They couldn't give us any information. They will reach out to us. We're now in month six. No, no, sorry, month four. No access to any funds. What we'd managed to do is personally pay the staff so we could just keep going. But we was in this state where we couldn't access any funds. We contact our solicitor who said, I can pay it. Sorry, I can get your bank release. It's going to cost you this much.

And was this much a lot?

This much was more money than we could afford because all our money was in the bank. So we had to say, can we, can you do it? And then we take the money out of the bank. Obviously they're not going to do that. So we was in a situation that was very, very difficult to get out of. Anyway. Five minutes of speaking to him on the phone, he said, leave it with me. Within the hour, he had a letter drafted, sent off to the bank and within, I'd say, a day, our account was unfrozen.

Right.

When we asked for an explanation of why it was frozen, it was a precaution to ensure that, that the person who had spoken to on the phone had not been scammed. So we went through all of that with no explanation at the time to protect the customer.

So I think you told me this, Paul, so maybe you can let me know if this is right. But have the banks just been given more power now so they can freeze your account for 30 days with basically no warning or basically no notice, should they choose?

The banks have got power to ensure that proceeds of crime, money laundering, are not being committed with the funds. So they can take as much time as they need to ensure that the funds are going to the correct place. I'll give you an example.

Okay, first let me read this. So one of my clients, she jumped on a thread of ours on social media. And, and she said she tried to buy a very small amount of crypto. We're talking couple of grand. And her bank was frozen and they refused to let her open her account unless she stated that she'd been scammed. Right. So she said, no, no, no, I've bought crypto. No, you've been scammed. No, I've bought crypto. No, I've been scammed. We will not unfreeze your account unless you say you've been scammed. So she said she was two hours on the phone at the end of this process, trying to deal with it, get her account back open, bearing in mind that's where she spends her money to live, in that account. And in the end she had to lie and say she'd been scammed as opposed to try to buy crypto to get a Bank account back open.

That is illegal.

Well, they did it.

Yeah. So she, she could have a claim there.

Okay.

And I'll tell you why.

Okay. So if that's illegal, but they're doing it how they're getting away with it.

So this is what we do. Right. So this is.

You had a story. Sorry, I just wanted to.

Yeah. So this is, this is where banks cross the line, right? Yeah. They're allowed, they're allowed to check.

They're check for fraud scams.

The Ombudsman, Financial Ombudsman specifically sets out training to ensure that they can check for any financial proceeds, proceeds of crime, any financial wrongdoing, you know, terrorism, all this sort of stuff. So they're trying to. Anyone who was to walk into a bank and say, I want to withdraw £25,000, whatever, £10,000, whatever it may be, the bank are allowed to ask you, what's that for? If you don't answer, they can withdraw that. They can say, you cannot have this money.

Right. So let me tell you another story before you tell yours. Another friend of mine will actually what first happened was a friend of mine called up the bank and said he wanted to withdraw. Trent, a friend of mine called up the bank and said he wanted to withdraw 20 grand in cash. And they said, what's it for? He said, none of your business, it's my money. By the way, they can see that he's been a customer for 30 years. They said, you can't withdraw the money. So he went into the bank the next day, he said, I'd like 20 grand, please, of my own money. They said, what's it for? And we want to know where it's going. He said, none of your business is my money. They would not let him take his money out of his bank and they know he's been a customer for 30 years. This recent budget should warn you that your pension is not safe and secure and they're coming for your inheritance. Do you even know how much is in your pension or where your pension is invested? Add to this the recent inheritance tax grab on your pensions and the risk of a market crash. You probably didn't know this and I didn't until recently, but physical gold can be added to your pension. Pot gold is inheritance tax free and has grown 700% in the last 20 years. You probably know from my content I'm investing heavily in silver and gold and that's why I've partnered with Direct Bullion. Myself and Nigel Farage are brand ambassadors and Direct Bullion can help you with gold to protect and grow your pension. I buy my gold and silver from direct bullion and I don't earn any money on any purchases of gold or silver if you buy direct from direct bullion. So if you go to robmore.directbullion.com you can get a great price on your silver and gold and you can get the pension gold investing guide completely for free. As you know, I don't do many strategic partnerships and when I do, I do them with people who are credible, who've been doing it a long time, who invest in things that I invest into. And gold and silver's going wild. I'm investing heavily in gold and silver and I recommend you check out robmore.directbullion.com.

And they're allowed to do that.

Is that right?

Morally?

No, because some people, again, all the people who are on my social media defending the bank say, well, you, you know, that's to stop people getting scammed. But is there an argument, well, if someone's been with the bank for 30 years, it's their responsibility, let them have the money. If they get scammed, it's their fault. But this feels like too much control from the banks because it sounds like now you have to convince the banks of where you're going to spend your money and if they don't like where you're going to spend your money, that is in the new Trump coin or in Bitcoin or in gold, they can go, no, we believe it's a scam.

Yeah. Or high risk.

Oh, high risk. Now isn't it up to us how much we risk our money?

That is why I believe we're too Molly coddled in this country because now.

Now you bring up something. So I still want you to tell this, these stories, by the way, but that's something I have thought about. Maybe there should be slightly less regulation and if someone takes their money out and gambles it or someone gets scammed, well then that they've learned by doing it. Because how do you learn to stand up to a bully, get punched in the face and defend yourself?

The problem with that approach is, and I do understand that, I do get.

It, but there's another thing here. It's the banks and the bailouts and the bail ins.

Well, the problem with that approach is, and I do understand, I fully get.

That because I think that's what you were saying, isn't it?

Well, I've seen it from the customer side as well, and that is I get that approach. But the problem with that is if you've got an old lady.

Ish. Yes.

75, 80 years old.

Yeah.

And someone has very convincingly said to.

Them, go to the bank.

Go to the bank, get this money out.

Yeah.

Whatever it may be. And that's their only retirement money.

Yeah.

Then there is a, you know, where, where do you change when you say, like, maybe we should have it, because there is got to be a level of protection because now that lady's got nothing.

Okay. And I've seen that and I acknowledge that. And just like when you talk about politics and you say, well, if I was a politician, I'd do this and this and this. Actually being in there, in reality would be difficult. And I imagine managing trillions of transactions and trillions of pounds is difficult. But doesn't it feel like the banks have a bit too much control of our own money? I'll give you another example. My wife manages some of our crypto and like, I chucked her ten grand and I said, okay, just put it into a couple of our cryptos. And the bank that she uses would let her make a maximum transaction of 1 and a half thousand pounds. And you get a maximum of 5,000amonth. And you get a maximum of, I think five transactions if you try a transaction, but it doesn't go through, which often happens quite a lot. That counts as a transaction. So basically you've got five tries to a maximum of, of five grand a month to put into any crypto, by the way, and that includes bitcoin. That seems wrong to me.

Yeah.

What do you think is wrong?

And that's.

But they get away with it.

Yeah, but they couldn't and they shouldn't. Yeah, yeah. So this is what I was bringing you back to. So where the banks cross the line.

Yeah.

Now to give you an example.

Where the banks cross the line.

This is.

I'm reading back for part two. Where the banks cross the line.

I want to read this word for word.

Sorry, Paul, I've interrupted you loads of times. I'm going to let you read it.

So blanket bans on transactions with certain merchants.

Merchant equals bank, in my opinion.

So. But that's. No, that's crypto. Gold. So I'll say gold, a band. So this is where banks cross the line. This is a red flag indicator when there's a blanket ban on transactions with certain merchants. So I have it. One of my managers, Sean, he has lost millions of pounds in transaction in deals, in transactions due to one particular.

Building society who won't allow people.

They have physically said, yeah, they have physically said, if you cannot buy gold.

With our bank, they have banned buying gold. Yeah, well, they probably. I bet they haven't banned them buying gold from the Royal Mint.

Probably not. No, probably not.

Wow.

But we have it. We've lost millions. I can't even stress to you how many millions through one building society.

And let's just be clear again. You sell gold.

Yeah.

You don't sell tin, you don't sell tulips.

That's physically delivered to the customer.

So you sell physical gold, I. E. The one thing that's the most money of all money ever. The one thing that transcends the. The earth. Gold is older than the earth itself.

But it is against the banks, isn't it? That's the problem.

Why is gold against the bank?

If the gold. If the money's in gold, it's not in the bank. It's not in the bank.

So basically, the banks make their own rules with your money and won't allow you to put your money in things they deem as competitive to them. Really?

But that is a red flag. They shouldn't be doing that.

No.

Because it's your money and I have the solution.

What's the solution?

The solution is. So this is what we. This is what we set out. Yeah. This is what we, we. We say to. To our customers. And it is, it does work. But they. You need to say, right, if you've got. If you get an issue and there's.

Let me just set this up. You have got a script to say to banks when banks stop you making transactions, if they want to buy gold or crypto or use their money. Is this what you're saying?

Correct.

All right, let's go.

Yep. So let me just find the exact.

So I take your time, by the way, while Paul's finding this. Paul owns Direct Bullion and I bought quite a lot of gold and silver off of you in recent times.

Not enough.

Not well, of course. But then if I bought a billion off you, it wouldn't be enough. And I know you. You sold me some ingots. Is that what they're called? Recently? And you get limited edition coins and things.

Yep.

So, Kelsey, could you put this link in the comments? Paul and I are actually partners. I don't get any kickback on any gold or silver that you'd ever buy from Direct Bullion. But if you use my link, will you give people a better price?

Yeah, yeah. Using my link, will you give everyone a discount from your audience?

Okay, great. So the link is robmore.directbullion.com so I know because one of Paul's people, Colin, has created like a prospectus and giving you some guidance and support on buying gold and silver. There's this cool thing about being able to buy gold in your pension, which I didn't know about until Paul taught me that. So just to be clear, I don't get any commissions or kickbacks. We're partners. We've done our deal a long time ago. We're long term partners. So the link is robmore.directbullion.com Now I personally, I'm not against buying from the Royal Mint, but the reason I buy from Paul is if I buy from the Royal Mint, I'm basically buying from the government. So if I buy from the Royal Mint, I'm not sure I've got privacy, security, discretion, I don't know because they're.

Watching and you're paying more money.

Oh, okay, well, pay more money. So that's obviously a big thing.

They're a lot more expensive, right?

Wow, I didn't know that. But don't worry, I haven't cheated on you. So. But surely the point of gold, Paul, is, is it a level of discretion and security as well as beating inflation?

I believe so, yeah.

I, E, I, I store it myself, it's mine, it's going to go up in value. No one can steal it, no one can inflate it away. The banks can't lend and invest it. There won't be a run on it.

People can steal it.

Well, of course, but the banks can't. Unless you store it in the banks.

Yeah. Never store it in the banks. Right. That's, that's the same as drawing your money out, putting it back in the bank. It now becomes the bank again. Never store, never, never store anything valuable in a bank safety deposit box. Never.

There you go. So that's important. If you store something valuable in a bank safety deposit box, then the things that you're storing that are valuable, that you're supposed to be protecting away from inflation and cash in the banking system are, in the banking system. So for example, if you store gold for people, you don't, you store it independently.

Correct.

Okay, fine. So the link is robmore.directbullion.com Go there now, just pop your details in, get your prospectus. Then like I said, I'm getting commissions or kickbacks. We've already, you know, we're already long term partners. I'll give you a minute to do that now and then Paul, you're going to read out how to. Sort of.

So if you get an issue like that, you want to pay something from.

Your bank into crypto or gold.

Into crypto or gold or anything else, this applies to anything, as long as it's not criminal.

Right.

You're not buying anything that you shouldn't be buying, Then this is what you would say. Please give me a specific reason for refusal and how can I fix it? It's as simple as that.

And what will they do?

They have to. So if you're just dealing with a cashier, someone on, you know, in branch, get that, get them to kick that up to the manager.

Could you say it again?

Yep. Very, very straightforward. Please give me a specific reason for refusal and how I can fix it.

And then what will happen?

And then if you're in branch, that should go to a manager. If you're on the phone and that you're speaking to a. To a member of the fraud team, that also should go to a manager.

Yeah.

And. And you got to be very persistent.

Yeah.

You might have to say that a couple of times.

If.

Yeah. And this is a nice big if. If they do not do that, you can go to the financial ombudsman, right? You can. And this is for free. You can go to them for free.

Yeah.

And you can end up in a situation where they have to give you compensation. And if it's that severe, you can take them to court.

Okay. Is there another way here whereby you just keep minimum amount of money in the banks?

Well, that's the best way.

Yeah. And more money and gold and crypto and everything else.

Assets, right? Assets what make you rich, right?

Yeah. Yeah. Do you think gold is an asset?

It's the best asset. Why? Because it's instant liquidity.

Yeah.

Yeah. So you can hold gold, you can ride the wave. 40% last year. I think we're on about nearly 20% so far this year.

40% growth in gold last year.

Correct?

40%. So that was more than crypto last year as more than bitcoin.

Gold's on a run at the minute and it just shows you. This is what I was back to. My gold shows you where the economy is.

Yeah. Right.

And it's not going to slow down.

So what you're saying is the worse the economy is, the better gold is doing. Usually.

I'm probably the only person that would like another lockdown.

I bet you'd like a war, wouldn't you?

Anything that. Anything along those lines. Revolution is good for gold.

Big hyperinflation. All of this is good for Gold.

Massively good for gold. Because when we do get to a stage where inflation is out of control and whatever this big thing that I think is coming comes, where are you going to put your money?

Well, I think I know the answer now. Gold. Well, you know I do. You know, I buy gold and silver from you.

You're asset rich, right? You think your whole, your whole career is about assets. Yeah, they're all the wealthiest people in the world. I don't think you'll be able to show me one that doesn't have assets. And you're just sitting on cash.

No. Well, like everyone I know that's rich knows that cash is actually a problem. So I've actually interviewed some very wealthy people who are desperate to get rid of cash. Because, I mean, imagine inflation in actual reality is 5%. Well, on 100 quid, you're not really panicking, are you? But on 100 million, you're losing a lot to cash. Now, the big billionaires say, like Warren Buffett, who sells stocks and holds it in cash, is just storing it for a buying opportunity, but he'll have ways of, of protecting that. Yeah, but, yeah, like for, for broke people, cash is the solution. For rich people, cash is the problem. You need to get money out of cash and into assets to beat inflation rather than cash that loses inflation.

Why do you think all these Russian oligarchs buy yachts? Do you think yachts make money? No, it's a bigger hole to have cash than it is to have a yacht.

He.

It's crazy, you know, you just, you've got to buy things. This is why they, you know, you've got all these Chinese multi, multi millionaires that are just buying London property.

Right? Yeah.

Spend what? Art is another one.

Yeah.

You know, one of my good friends, his wife, she sells, she's a real estate agent, a state agent, and she's been tasked with a development in Curzon street in London. Mayfair.

Right.

All foreign buyers. None of them intend to live there. Just storing, just, just parking cash.

Yeah.

Now that is not back to the talk of moving money around in a transfer. That's not a great way to grow. Right. They'll park that money there. What good's that?

Well, for them, it's a good store of wealth.

For the individual, yes. For the nation, not great.

No. You need money movement.

You want it moving. Right. You want someone who's going to live there out spending the money in the restaurants and the shops, paying the taxes.

Isn't Hyde park one, like, virtually empty?

I think I Think most of Mayfair property is overseas.

Store of wealth.

Yeah.

Okay, let me ask you this question about gold. Is there a shortage of gold right now in the world or in the banks or in the vaults?

I don't think there's an actual shortage of gold currently.

Is there a shortage of being able to get it access to.

It's more challenging now than it was 10 years ago, so it's less easy to get. Yeah. And I think we're working.

Isn't that a good thing, though, because.

It'S scarcity in the short term for prices. Yes. But I think we're coming to a period in the next 10 to 15 years where we will hit peak gold.

As in, we can't mine anymore quick enough.

There won't be enough to mine for the demand. We're already at the capacity of demand as it is. But we're finding enough to keep up with demand.

I mean, surely that one of the reasons that prices of gold go up is supply demand, Surely, Isn't it everything, right?

Everything's supply, demand.

Yeah.

You know, when we get to that stage there, when we get to peak gold and then we're past peak gold. That is when, like bitcoin, when you. When, when. When we get to the stage where there is less bitcoin to buy and the price goes insane and you won't be able to buy it anymore. No one will want to sell it. And that will be the same with gold. I think when we get to peak golden on the way, the other way down, when there's too much demand and there isn't enough, the price will go crazy, but no one will want to sell it, so.

Which will just keep pushing the price up more and more and more. Hence why bitcoin's gone up so fast, because it's such a limited supply.

Supply and demand.

Wow. Okay, fine. So. Robmore.directbullion.com Is there anything else we've missed talking about the banking system? I'll tell you what. What about our friend Nigel? You knew him when he was going through the debanking scandal. Do you think that was immoral or do you think it was almost illegal to shut Nigel Farage or anyone down for being politically exposed? Because I don't think anyone knew what a pep was. A politically exposed person, probably. Nigel familiarized everyone to it because there were people who had views on social media that banks might not like, and they were. They couldn't open new bank accounts or they were getting them shut down and they didn't know what to do. And they were just stuck. Andrew Tate had loads of bank accounts shut down. I don't even get a normal bank account now. And then it happened to Nigel Farage and he's a guy you don't want to mess with. He's quite strong and obstinate and he took them down and the head of NatWest's head. What happened? And was that illegal?

I don't think it's illegal. I think they have the right to be able to choose their customers.

A bank can say, because of your social media post, you're not allowed a bank account and nor are your family. They can say that. I mean, his family couldn't get a bank account.

No, I know, I know. So when. So when we do an AML check.

Anti money laundering.

Anti money laundering. Yeah. We have to check everybody. Yeah, Every single time we do that. The second section is this a pep. Every single person.

So you have to actually write down if it's a politically exposed person.

No, we just put in your name and it will tell us.

Right.

So even if there was another Rob Moore who was an MP for wherever that would come up, and it could be that you were potentially that person.

But what is it? How do they even define what a politically exposed person is?

So someone that's politically exposed. I know that sounds crazy, but what does that mean? So if you're in a political environment.

But Andrew Tate isn't political. In terms of. He's not in a political environment. No, you're not debanked.

Yeah, but when. So that's something separate, right? Yeah. When you're a politically exposed person, that why they do that check is because they want to understand, is this person within the political system, could they easily be bribed? You know, they're in a position of their, you know, a position of power.

So they can be got at, but not their kids.

Oh, no, no. This is. This is why it's ludicrous.

And of course, Nigel did a subject access request, got all the emails, got all the communication and basically they just thought he was too far.

Right, yeah. Now that is wrong. Yeah, that's why.

That's why he took them down.

That's why he took them down. And that is. There's a difference.

And hadn't he been with one of the banks for like 30, 40 years? We're not mentioning banks names, are we?

But I think when you say, is that illegal? You know, and then you're asking about, you know, whether or not that's right, that's definitely wrong. And I think from a From a banking point of view, you know, if you. If you don't want to have a customer for whatever particular reason, you've got a justification as to why that person shouldn't be at your bank. Now, I think that's the bank's right to say, right, look, we don't want you.

I acknowledge that.

But what. The route that he had, what happened to him, that's outrageous. That he. I think that was. That was really, really.

So you think that was very wrong.

Really wrong, yeah.

Well, it was proven to be wrong.

Yeah. And the worst part about the whole thing is.

What?

That's just one person. There's hundreds of thousands, if not millions, in similar situations that have had their accounts just outright taken away from them, debanked. But they don't have the Subject act requests, you know, they've not gone through that route. And even if they did, they don't have the clout behind them to make it known.

Yeah.

So when I spoke to Nigel about this, when I first, first got chatting to him in regards to the debanking, he had thousands and thousands of people reach out to him. Thousands and thousands. And it is one of those things. Unfortunately, when you are debanked, there's not a debanking helpline.

Debankers Anonymous, who do you call, what do you do?

Unfortunately, it's just. It's just one of those things that we are as. As the Joe Public. You just got to take it, you know, and luckily we had someone like Nigel that could sit there and say, look, this is happening to me. Speak up.

Yeah.

And unfortunately for the bank in question, I think it's cost them, has cost.

Them a lot, but it cost the head the job. Yeah, yeah. And I acknowledge that the banks are a convenient service, useful for direct debits, useful, you know, not.

It's a necessity.

Yeah, it kind of is. Because if you had the cash, you store it, everyone knows everyone stores cash at the house, there'd be a lot more robberies. It's like, I'm not anti banks.

Yeah.

I'm not anti government, because government keep us safe. We've got a defense budget, you know, it helps. But we have, surely, as the people, we have to hold them to account to serve the people, because aren't they there to serve the people?

This is why I've said to you before, there is a gap in the market, something that I'm very keen to expose. But to have a bank that is a proper bank.

What's a proper bank?

A proper bank that can look after your Funds safely give you peace of mind that you know, that you can, you know, put your hard. At the end of the day, what do you do? You exchange your life for cash, for money. So that's your life that you're giving to the bank. You need to know that's protected. Right?

Right.

100% safe. That's what it should be. When was the last time you called your bank?

A long while ago.

And would you say the reason you don't call them because of the aggravation that is to call them?

I don't want to be waiting for two or three hours on the phone, do I?

Now imagine another business that did that.

But imagine a small business, private business.

There was no way on earth that you would. When was the last time you looked at banking reviews? They don't even have them because there's so many bad reviews about banks. You wouldn't touch them with a barge pole.

Right. Wow.

Now imagine if you could bridge that gap and provide all of that good service.

But surely trying to start up an independent challenger bank is going to be so hard.

Revolut have done it.

True. I bet that's cost them billions.

Monzo.

Yeah, Starling did a while ago, didn't they? Okay, so it can be done. So you want to launch a bank. I've got a guess. Right. This is my guess. You're going to launch a bank and there's going to be a gold reserve instead of it being a. Is that. Am I somewhere close here?

You wouldn't be miles away from there. Okay with the assumption? Yeah.

Wow. All right then. Is there anything else we haven't talked about? We started by talking about how the banks control your money. And we've covered who has the money and we've covered inflation and where it started and you know, the controls and checks that the banks put in place. And we've covered the central digital currency and politically exposed people and debanking. We've covered a lot, actually. Remember everyone, if you do want to invest in gold or silver or even like move your pension into some gold, go to robmore directbullion, because that's Paul's company and Paul is my gold and silver partner. Like I said, Paul gives you great prices and I don't take any commissions. That's not how we work. Is there anything we've missed?

I mean, I think one useful tool. I know we spoke of pensions before, but there is a useful tool out there where you can theoretically become your own bank.

Wow. How do you do that then?

Buy it? Having A SIP or a ssas.

Okay, so self invested personal pension.

Yeah. And a small self administered scheme. Okay, so SIPs are for personal people, like individuals.

Okay, so your own personal pension that you control.

Correct. So you know a lot of people, many people will have a private pension.

Yeah.

Aviva.

Yeah.

Scottish widow, you know, as opposed to legal general. Yeah. So very similar. But instead of doing it through a big conglomerate like that.

Yeah.

You do it for yourself. Yeah.

Okay. And so do you therefore define where you invest the funds?

Correct.

Yeah. And I guess therefore there should be less fees because it's not being administered by a big company.

Correct.

Okay, fine.

Okay, so SIP would be for an individual and a ssas for a business owner.

Okay. And how do you essentially become your own bank then with that?

So with a SIP or a ssas, you can offset your earnings from your business into your sass. You can put into up to £60,000 a year tax free.

Per partner.

Per person. Yeah, per partner in the business. As a, as a SIP, it's the same. You can put £60,000 per year into your pension, into your SIP, and then you can then choose where you want to invest that.

Right?

Yeah.

Although isn't one of them commercial property?

Only commercial property you get the only stipulations. Yeah, you can't do residential. Yeah, yeah. You can do commercial property.

That's stopping people basically buying their own home.

Correct, yeah, yeah. Closing loopholes, you can't have it all. Perfect. But you can do commercial property.

You can.

And this is why when I say, you know, having your own bank. So if you've, if you've never done it before and this is your first time and you've been in business for many years, you can actually back date three years worth of 60,000 allowance into your SIP. Yeah, yeah. So you can put.

And that essentially comes off your corporation tax.

100% tax free. Yeah, 100% tax free. Tax free. So that's a way to lower your corporation tax that goes into your SIP or your SSAs. So the way I always say and explain it is you've got a choice to make. You can either pay in tax or you can pay it to yourself. So the maximum you can do is 60,000. Once that money goes into your SIPP or your SSAS, you can then use that to invest into all the normal things you would as a standard pension anyway. You, you can put it into funds that would be into the stock market S&P 500. You can put it into bonds, mutual trust, whatever, you know, all the regular stuff. But you can also put it into.

Gold, which I didn't know about, which you.

And you can also put it into commercial property.

Yeah.

Now this is where it gets really interesting. This is where it becomes your own bank.

Yeah.

So what I do, this is my SaaS personally. I have an amount that's in there. I purchased a business, which you can also do through a ssas. I purchase a business. That business came with a warehouse. That warehouse sits in my SSAs. That warehouse pays rent. That rent goes into my SSAs every single month. Then I transfer that straight into gold. I can allow the gold to build up, which I have. It's built up over a period of time. I can now take a loan against 50% of the value of my gold. So I can now take that value.

It's a tax free drawing, essentially 100%.

Yeah. So I can now take the money of that. I can. Look at how much gold I've got. Gold is easy to lend against because it's a safe, secure asset. I can now go out and buy another commercial property. That commercial property can be put in the SSAs or the rent comes back into the SSAs to pay off the loan that I've taken. So theoretically, I'm getting a commercial property for free.

Wow.

And then you can use that over and over and over again as many times as you like, treating it like your own personal bank.

Wow. What a perfect way to end. Can you help people with that?

We can indeed.

Okay, so same link.

Yep.

Robmore.directbullion.com so if people want help with administering SIPs or SSAs and investing in gold in their pension, you can help them with it.

We can indeed. We are only the supplier of gold, but we work with some really good partners who are SIP and SAS providers regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority. So, you know, you've got the. We work with the very best, but we'll help you. You know, we can put you into contact, help you get our account set up and then we just help you along the way.

Wow.

It's phenomenal, Paul.

And it's Paul Withers of Direct Bullion. Thanks for coming in and talking about the banks.

My favorite place to come and visit all the time.

Thanks, Paul.

Cheers, mate. Thank you. This episode was brought to you by Disruptive Media, helping bold entrepreneurs stand out through podcasting, video and social content. Visit disruptivemedia.co.uk to learn more. This episode was brought to you by Disruptive Media, Helping bold entrepreneurs stay stand out through podcasting, video and social content. Visit disruptivemedia.co.uk to learn more.